6: Seeing Beyond Conflict: Participating in Life and Leisure in the West Bank

Expectations exist to be upended. More often than we’re willing to admit, expectations are often malnourished guesses masquerading as hypotheses. Tucked into their dark recesses are biases and prejudice. They may spark questions and curiosity and inspire imaginations but expectations are rarely great. We voluntarily shackle ourselves to our preconceptions so there’s a quiet joy to be found in the moment when expectations are dashed. It’s liberating to replace the broad strokes of speculative anticipation with the granularity and texture offered by witnessing and beholding what was once just a mental image. This is where learning occurs, the sort of learning that is revelatory by upending biases and misconceptions. My expectations of the West Bank kept my mind active before I arrived but they were also a blindfold of their own. It was a relief to have my expectations upended, replaced by a more nuanced understanding which emerged from embodied and experiential learning.